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Inupiaq Eskimo artist Aakatchaq is Kikiktagrukmiut , born and raised above the Arctic Circle in Kotzebue, Alaska. Aakatchaq began creating art professionally in 1999, and continues to experiment with new materials such as moving from canvas portraits to those on stretched caribou and deerskin, or creating visual effects with caribou hair in paintings. More recently she began working with aluminum and wood whose sensual creations swim down the walls of the newly remodeled high school in the Northwest Arctic Borough in Northwest Alaska. Her art began with acrylic paintings and has evolved from canvas to caribou & beluga intestine, to aluminum and wood pieces. She began carving walrus ivory tusks with exotic hardwood and more recently she began creating her caribou skin masks.

Aakatchaq

Tribe

"Rebirth"

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Raised in the small Alutiiq village of Old Harbor, Alfred Naumoff has been carving for nearly 30 years and he is widely recognized for his skill. He has sold examples of his carvings privately and through the gift stores at the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, the Alutiiq Museum and the Alaska Native Heritage Center. Additionally, he has contributed pieces to the Alutiiq Museum’s permanent collection, acted as a carving demonstrator at the Alaska Native Heritage Center, and taught carving at the Palmer Museum. In 2005, Naumoff was one of 10 Alutiiq artists who traveled to France to study Alutiiq masks in the Pinart collection, a journey that inspired much of his present work.

One of Alfred specialties is boat building. He learned qayaq construction by working with the Late Larry Matfay, one of the foremost Kodiak Alutiiq tradition bearers of the twentieth century and the last chief of Akhiok. As such, Naumoff’s work reflects a continuous chain of knowledge passed through generation of Alutiiq men. Larry Matfay learned boat building from his father Sava Matfay and his maternal grandfather Kejuk. Importantly Larry’s wife, the late Martha Naumoff Matfay, was Alfred Naumoff’s aunt (his father’s sister). Thus, Naumoff’s training reflects the Alutiiq tradition of apprenticing young carver to experienced male relatives.

Alfred Naumoff

Tribe

"Alutiiq Mask"

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Bryon Amos has been a sculpture, mask maker, also an ivory carver since the age of 9. His father the late Walter T. Amos was also a famous mask maker originating from Nunivak Island. Bryon Amos waited 8 years before replicating his father’s masks made from wood. It is his heritage to keep the family tradition within the family lineage of ancient traditions passed down from generation to generation.

In the ancient times the wood was found from the shores of Nunivak Island, the wood was a highly special commodity for the people. The paint of the masks was made from red ochre rock, mixed in seal blood. The black was also a charcoal rock mixed in seal blood, the white paint originated four feet beneath the ground as white clay, the string used is original walrus sinew.

The double walrus mask design was first originated by my father many years ago. The design is unique of two sitting walrus attached together with a face of a man in the middle. The inner wood ring presents the earth, and the outer ring the universe. The mask presented was made for festival gatherings, for dancing purposes, also made for trade goods, tools, food and clothing. The mask made today are usually made for sale, by corporate businesses, individual businesses, also high profile arts collectors.

The top piece presents the loon head with a minnow in its mouth. The hands of the man, the wings of the loon, the seal design on the sides of the mask, the feet of the man, the webbed feet of the loon, and the loons tail. This mask presented the lifeline of the ancient people of Nunivak Island, without the walrus, the people would perish, for the walrus provided every necessary food supply, tools for hunting, weaponry, clothing, the walrus skin provided an abundant and necessary covering for kayaks, skin boats to travel the seas and ocean.

Bryon Amos

Tribe

"Mask"

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Athabascan artist Corinna Evans family hails from the interior village of Ruby. Corinna first started sewing at the age of 13. Her first works were small beaded and caribou tufted objects and quill jewelry. Corinna uses many different materials to create her one of a kind works including porcupine quill, caribou hair, moosehide, glass beads, dentallium shells and all kinds of animal claws. Corinna currently lives and works in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Corinna Evans

Tribe

"Athabascan Chief Necklace"

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Crystal Rose Demientieff Worl is Tlingit Athabascan from Raven moiety, Sockeye Clan, from the Raven House. She is a child of a Thunderbird and from the Chilkat region in Southeast Alaska. From her mother’s side, she is Deg Hit’an Athabascan from Fairbanks Alaska. Raised between Fairbanks and Juneau, she was introduced at a young age to her traditional arts, practices, and storytelling. In 2013 Crystal earned a Bachelor’s of Fine Art in Jewelry Metals and an Associate’s of Fine Art in Moving Images from the Institute of American Indian Arts.

Crystal experiments with kiln-cast glass, printmaking, painting, and silversmithing. She recently began working with fish skin, seal gut-skin, and furs. Crystal studies traditional Tlingit formline design and Athabascan beadwork patterns. She experiments applying her designs within mixed media and performance, including aerial dancing. She practices the recreation and modernization of her Clan’s stories and Raven stories from home. Her work explores the relationships and bonds between her people, the land, and the animals.

Today Crystal lives in Juneau, Alaska working as a co-owner of Trickster Company with her brother Rico Worl. Trickster Company promotes innovative indigenous design focused on the Northwest Coast art and exploration of themes and issues in Native culture.

Artist StatementI am Tlingit and Athabascan from Juneau and Fairbanks, Alaska. My mother Beverly Demientieff is Deg Hit’an Athabascan from Holy Cross, Alaska. My father Rodney Worl is Tlingit from the Thunderbird Clan. I am Raven moiety, Lukaahadi Sockeye Clan, from the Raven House from the Chilkat region of Southeast Alaska.

I am a storyteller, a dancer, and an artist. As a visual artist I create mixed media work with jewelry metals, kiln cast glass, printmaking, and painting. Many of my materials and dyes are harvested from Alaska, such as blueberries, fireweed, and wood. Recently I have been studying how to work with animal hides, skins, intestine, and furs.

The stories I share in my art are about Raven. The forms I focus on are based on traditional Tlingit design that are often intertwined with Athabascan beadwork design. I practice the recreation and modernization of Tlingit and Athabascan designs.

The purpose of my art is to bring attention to cultural growth and discovery. My creative process is a means to bridge my experiences between two worlds, the traditional worlds of Tlingit, and the modern world. I create art to share my ancestral knowledge of creation and life and pass on old values to the new generations.

Crystal Worl

Tribe

"Beaded Seal"

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Da-ka-xeen Mehner (Tlingit/N’ishga) uses the tools of family ancestry and personal history to build his art. Born in Fairbanks, Alaska to a Tlingit/N’ishga Mother and Hippy/American father his work stems from an examination of a multicultural heritage and social expectations and definitions. Da-ka-xeen was raised in two environments, one as an urban Native in Anchorage and the other as a rural Hippy in Fairbanks living without electricity, running water or phones, and heating the house with a wood stove. In particular his work has focused on the constructs of Native American identity, and an attempt to define the Self outside of these constructs. He uses the materials and tools of his family to express himself. From the steel and concrete of his Labor Union father, to the crook knife and cedar of his Alaska Native ancestors, Da-ka-xeen Mehner’s artwork reflects his heritage. In an expanded view of “tradition,” Da-ka-xeen also includes the inherited tools and skills of photography that were passed down to him from his maternal Uncles. Da-ka-xeen received his A.A. from the Institute of American Indian Arts, and his B.F.A. from the University of New Mexico. From 1994-2000 Mehner served as the founder and director of Site 21/21, a contemporary art gallery in Albuquerque, NM, and was a founding member/owner of the (Fort) 105 Art Studios in downtown Albuquerque in 1998. Da-ka-xeen returned to Alaska in 2000 and earned his M.F.A in Native Arts from the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 2007. His work in photography and sculpture has been exhibited from New York to California; Alaska to New Mexico. Collections include the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, the University of Alaska Museum of the North (Fairbanks, AK), and the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (Santa Fe, NM), C.N. Gorman Museum (Davis CA) and the Alaska State Museum (Juneau, AK). His work has been featured in the art magazines Sculpture and American Indian Art, and in numerous newspapers, art catalogs, and blogs. Mehner has received numerous awards including a 2015 USA Rasmuson Fellow, a 2015 Eiteljorg Contemporary Art Fellow, a 2014 Native Arts & Culture Foundation Artist Fellow, and a 2011 Rasmuson Fellow. He is an Associate Professor of Native Arts at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the director of the UAF Native Arts Center.

Da-ka-xeen

Tribe

"Following the Red Line"

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Barbara Donatelli and Jaclyn Sallee teamed up to design and construct this unique art piece. The top of the ottoman is covered in seal skin adorned with halibut and salmon skin-covered button and decorated with abalone buttons and Czech glass beads. The base of the piece is metallic leather and strips of salmon skin. Barbara is of Yup’ik descent and Jaclyn is of Inupiaq descent.

Barbara Donatelli and Jaclyn Sallee

Tribe

"A Very Vogue Qasigiaq"

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Artist Statement
If you look at a forest, you see vertical lines, and layers – so many layers. I love nature, I love color, texture and my inspiration comes from all these wild places. I am a non-objective / abstract painter interested in the creative process, chaos, and finding order within the chaos. I receive inspiration for my culture (Northern Cheyenne Tribe and Northern European ancestry), emotions, and the environment around me. I love the challenge of manipulating oil paint using nonconventional tools and techniques. This process of creating allows my mind to imagine. For me each piece starts with a vision, location, or concept, and I create from there. IT is my hope that the final pieces allow the viewer’s imagination to track my experience, their experiences, and settle in the space of contemplation and connection.

The first recollection of my journey as an artist was in kindergarten when we were allowed to finger paint. I loved it and ended up painting with my knuckles because I loved the design it made when I went in a circle which created a pattern resembling the flower my mom grew in her garden. Since then I experimented with crayons and makers on living room walls, spray paint on the side of the house, pencil, acrylic, charcoal, and finally pastels and oil paints.

In high school I studied under a Wyoming artist Joe Arnold who provided the much needed focus and space for me to work. While studying at UAA I met a dear friend, artist, and professor of mind Steve Gordon. Steve helped to facilitate my love for oil painting and my growth as an artist to reflect the mental, spiritual, and underlying feeling that each must be allowed to express.

I love taking observations, experiences, and feelings and communicating them through art. I find in my own life, art, has always come to me with emotion. Desperation, exhilaration, sorrow, longing, redemption, love, and loss are a few of the common feelings that fuel my creative spirit.

For me art my art is to be experienced. There is the experience of imagining, daring, creating, following tangents, and creating again. It is my hope that the final pieces allow the viewer’s imagination to wander through my experience, their experiences, and settle in the space of contemplation and connection. So much of the human experience is unique but at the same time so much of it is to be shared. www.james.temte@gmail.com

James Temte

Tribe

"Anchorage Painting"

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I have been creating art my entire life. I began in the mediums of glass and ceramics with an extensive education in ceramics, the chemistry of clay and glazes, and kiln building. As a full time studio artist I produce kiln formed, flame-worked, and cast glass forms.

Working exclusively with Bullseye Glass, hand-rolled in Portland, Oregon, I produce decorative and functional sculpture, vessels, jewelry, tiles, and architectural glass. Each piece a one-of-a-king distinctive work of art, exclusively designed and created. I am inspired by nature, and people I have met, and travel. Each piece is uniquely made…details hidden in details created by hand with a care that reveals a timeless tradition of the craft.

Laura Mendola

Tribe

"Winter Birch and Ravens"

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Nick grew up in Tuntutuliak. His artwork is ivory carvings that are kind of traditional and non-traditional. Nick started making his artwork by watching his brother first and by playing with his tools. “He didn’t want me to touch his ivory so I started with moose bone and caribou bone, after watching people carve, I played around and taught myself how to carve. I made enough money out of the bone sculptures and I was able to buy my own tools. I use my artwork to tell a whole story about Eskimo life in the old days”.

Nick Evans

Tribe

"Whale Bone and Ivory Carving"

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Rob Johnson finds treasure in what other’s deem as trash and beauty where none is apparent, from the junkyard, to the elements the ocean currents deliver to the beach side. Coming from a long line of fishermen, the long winter months lends him time to be creative. The Metal-Head Octopus “Devil Fish” Wall Hanging is testament to the ability to find art in an old junk car.

Rob Johnson

Tribe

"Octopus"

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The intention of Ryan’s artwork is for it to be pleasing to look at from a distance and to entice the viewer to take a closer look to see how it was made or to guess the materials used. How it’s made, that’s the whole point. It’s the process we all enjoy. When viewers enjoy it, that is just a bonus. His process has evolved into a kind of dance. He get’s into a zone and it’s just like he’s dancing with the materials. It’s like his subtly vibrating scribbles continue to dance on the canvas.

C. Ryan Pierce studied art at Eastern Michigan University, Henry Ford Community College, and earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Northern Michigan University in 1998. His first concentration was drawing and his passion was figure studies. Forcing himself to paint and falling in love with the nature around him has brought Ryan to the dance he creates today. Ryan is a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina.

C. Ryan Pierce

Tribe

"Totem II"

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Timber Vavalis has been a dedicated wood carver in the traditional Pacific Northwest native form since the 60’s. Part Tlingit and Athabaskan, Timber was born in 1958 to John Vavalis, the grandson of Alice Jackson Vavalis of the Raven Sockeye Clan. He completed his first paddle at the age of eight, and has since expanded his repertoire of skills to create ceremonial masks, bentwood boxes, inlay panels and formline designs. He credits much of his development as an artist to his friend and mentor, master carver David Boxley.

Timber Vavalis

Tribe

"Killer Whale - Raven Paddle"

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Born February 6th 1984. I always wanted to do art since I was a kid. If you ask any of my classmates about me they will most likely say “he’s the one who always drawing during class”. The first time I sold artwork was to my shop teacher in 9th grade. I always had a desire to see someone’s reaction to my work that is really what drives me to do art. It’s also why I decided to learn art in college and try to build a career in art. Since then I am blessed to see my work become more popular. I love to challenge myself and that is why I chose oil painting with scenes of my traditional heritage and modern ideas. I was commissioned for the 9’x 12.5’ currently in the new hospital in Barrow. I am excited to see where my art leads me in the future.

Wendell Brower

Tribe

"Olgoonik Blanket Toss"

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Kayla Christiansen, a 22 year old Alutiiq artist, has been sewing with sealskin and beading since she was seven years old. Christiansen first learned how to sew with sealskin during an Alutiiq week in Old Harbor, where she grew up. With practice she developed her skill. At first, she gave away her pieces for free, but people told her it was so good she could make money from it. Christiansen started selling her pieces at age 12, after only five years of working with the material. She is also a full time student at UAA pursuing her Culinary Arts degree.

Kayla Christiansen

Tribe

"Alutiiq Headdress"

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The artwork, “You’re a Beauty,” is a multi-media painting on canvas of a sea otter. Alvin is a Sugpiaq painter and sculptor. He was raised on the island of Kodiak and earned his Master of Fine Arts from Arizona State University. His work, often multimedia, combines essence with the abstract, the hunter’s eye, and rock and roll.

Alvin Amason

Tribe

"You're a Beauty"

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Born in Chevak, Alaska in 1965 Earl Auralria Atchak studied carving with John Pingayak, Jerome Slats and many of his village elders.

He has been carving since 1980 and began a career as a professional artist in 1986 selling his work to traveling collectors. He quickly gained a reputation as a versatile artist working with a variety of media (including driftwood, ivory, bone, skins) to create masks, detailed Cupik figures, and elaborate dioramas depicting his villages’ lifestyle.

Capturing the essence and character of his subjects with simple and elegant lines, each work becomes a powerful statement. His work reveals an artist with great respect for his cultural identity and show his impressive mastery of three dimensions.

In 1990 Earl wrote and acted in a play that was produced by the Perseverance Theatre in Juneau, Alaska. They play traveled to New York City and was performed in the SoHo Theatre.

Earl still lives in Chevak and provides for his family with year-round subsistence hunting and his art.

His wife, Lisa Unin of Chevak does all the skin sewing for Earl’s projects.

Earl Atchak

Tribe

"Bowhead Whale Carving"

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David Boxley is a Tsimshian carver from Metlakatla, Alaska. Born in 1952, he was raised by his grandparents. From them he learned many Tsimshian traditions including the language. After high school he attended Seattle Pacific University where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in 1974. He became a teacher and basketball coach to Junior and Senior high students in Alaska and Washington.

While teaching in Metlakatla in 1979 he began devoting considerable time to the study of traditional Tsimshian carving. Through researching ethnographic material and carvings from museum collections, Boxley has learned the traditional carving methods of his grandfather’s people.

In 1986 he made a major career decision to leave the security of teaching and to devote all of his energies toward carving and researching the legacy of Northwest Coast Indian art. David Boxley has become a nationally recognized Indian artist showing and demonstrating his art in many parts of the United States and Europe.

In 1990, during the Goodwill Games Boxley was commissioned to carve the crown of a “Talking Stick.” Boxley’s carving of a unified American eagle and a Russian bear became a symbol of peace and harmony between the United States and Soviet Union and was an important part of the summer’s Goodwill Games. Messages from President George Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev were inserted in a hollowed portion of the talking stick and athletes carried the stick from Spokane through Washington and Oregon to Seattle for the opening ceremonies. In the millennium year 2000, David was commissioned to carve a Talking Stick for the office of the Mayor of Seattle.

Boxley’s functional and decorative pieces such as bentwood boxes, rattles, masks, prints and panels are in collections of the King and Queen of Sweden, the Emperor of Japan, the President of West Germany, the Mayor of Chongging (China), Microsoft, Walt Disney World, Knott’s Berry Farm and numerous other private collectors of fine Northwest Coast art.

David Boxley

Tribe

Tsimshian Button Blanket

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Holly Mititquq Nordlum
is an Inupiaq artist, born in Kotzebue, Alaska. Throughout her childhood Holly developed an appreciation for her culture, arts, and life in the arctic. A couple of great art teachers through high school, Susan Mason in Kotzebue and Cindy Yarawamai at Hawaii Preparatory Academy, both encouraged and inspired Holly. Her mother, Lucy, is also an artist and led her by example. Holly attended the University of Alaska, Anchorage and completed a Bachelor of Fine Art Degree in Graphic Design and Photography. While in school she also explored jewelry making, printmaking and sculpture.

Holly opened Naniq Design soon after graduation in 2004. She works full-time as a graphic and web designer and artist. She lives in Anchorage.

Holly Nordlum

Tribe

Nautaq or Gray Owl Painting

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From the artist: “My earliest introduction into fine art was from the colorful, detailed pictures of old world painting, depicting events from the bible my parents had. I started doing drawings at an early age, but did not start doing some sculpture until my late twenties. It was when I discovered the book “The Eskimo About Bering Straits by Edward William Nelson, with its pictures and detailed information of Yupik artifacts that my imagination really took off. I carried it around so much, it was like my bible, and in a way I guess it was. This book was the only piece of clear evidence that my ancestors were ingenious people who created a beautiful life for themselves in a harsh environment. It is hard to express in words the joy I have felt throughout the years since I began carving masks and other artifacts. I could hold these things in my hand instead of looking at pictures of them. I have never felt more centered and focused than after learning about he history of my people. I can reach into the future with a firm grip on the past.”

Jack Abraham

Tribe

Wooden Yupik Bird

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I gain insight and emotional strength through my people’s stories, the Inupiat, of their holistic subsistence lifestyle with the shamanism, ceremony, and the natural cycles of Arctic living. I hope to show the beauty of our culture with my work.

As a young new an artist, I was inspired by the Inuit of the SW Region of Alaska, the Yupik, with their dances and songs, beautiful intricate garments, accoutrements and elaborate ceremonies along with the additional Oral traditions of my Culture, the Inupiaq of Northern Alaska.

I am also inspired by many other contemporary artists like my instructors, Alan Houser, Fritz Shoulder, Charles Lollama, Paul Klee, and Kandinsky.

I was born in Fairbanks, but I am Inupiaq (Northern Eskimo) of Barrow and Point Hope in the Northern Arctic Alaska. I was raised in Barrow and Anchorage.

I was given the Inupiaq names, Ulaaq and Suweetcharuq. They are from my Great Uncle and, my Great Grandmother from Point Hope. My father was a whaler, hunter and an administrator in the North Slope Borough when it was first organized. While whaling with our family’s crew, I harpooned my own whale and subsistence hunted and fished.

I have been working as an artist for over 47 years. I graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, RI; the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and attended the Cooper Union School of Art in New York, NY.

I was an instructor, at the Institute of American Indian Art, in sculpture and glass; served as the head of the Sculpture Studio at the Visual Arts Center in Anchorage, Alaska and had a glass studio and taught glass blowing in Barrow in 1973 –74. I occasionally teach workshops in a variety of media.

I gain insight and emotional strength through my people’s stories, the Inupiat, of their holistic subsistence lifestyle with the shamanism, ceremony, and the natural cycles of Arctic living. I hope to show the beauty of our culture with my work.

As a young new an artist, I was inspired by the Inuit of the SW Region of Alaska, the Yupik, with their dances and songs, beautiful intricate garments, accoutrements and elaborate ceremonies along with the additional Oral traditions of my Culture, the Inupiaq of Northern Alaska.

I am also inspired by many other contemporary artists like my instructors, Alan Houser, Fritz Shoulder, Charles Lollama, Paul Klee, and Kandinsky.

I was born in Fairbanks, but I am Inupiaq (Northern Eskimo) of Barrow and Point Hope in the Northern Arctic Alaska. I was raised in Barrow and Anchorage.

I was given the Inupiaq names, Ulaaq and Suweetcharuq. They are from my Great Uncle and, my Great Grandmother from Point Hope. My father was a whaler, hunter and an administrator in the North Slope Borough when it was first organized. While whaling with our family’s crew, I harpooned my own whale and subsistence hunted and fished.

I have been working as an artist for over 47 years. I graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, RI; the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and attended the Cooper Union School of Art in New York, NY.

I was an instructor, at the Institute of American Indian Art, in sculpture and glass; served as the head of the Sculpture Studio at the Visual Arts Center in Anchorage, Alaska and had a glass studio and taught glass blowing in Barrow in 1973 –74. I occasionally teach workshops in a variety of media.